Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump took his first step to directly address African Americans, speaking Saturday at the Great Faith Ministries International in Detroit, telling the congregation: “We are all brothers and sisters”.
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US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tried on Saturday to court the black vote with an appearance before an African American Christian congregation in Detroit, where in a humble tone he said he was there to listen and learn. Trump didn’t focus on issues specific to African-Americans, saying instead he was there to listen to the community. Always”, he added. “And defend your right to worship.
Church pastor Bishop Wayne Jackson had invited NY billionaire Trump to attend the fellowship service.
Dr. Ben Carson, a retired pediatric neurosurgeon and a former resident of Detroit in his childhood, traveled with Trump to the church, per the information posted online by the Detroit Free Press.
“Becoming the nominee of the party of Abraham Lincoln. has been the greatest honor of my life”, he said.
Trump also praised the black church as the conscience of our country and said the nation needs a civil rights agenda of our time that includes the right to a quality education, safe neighborhoods and good jobs.
“Are you here just to use Detroiters as props in a re-imaging campaign, or are you here to have a real conversation where you’re finally going to give us the specifics on what you’re going to do to make American cities better?” he said, according to MLive.
The GOP nominee, who spoke for about 20 minutes, said the United States sidelines “young black men with tremendous potential” and that “our entire country misses out when we are unable to harness the potential and energy of these folks”.
“This has been an fantastic day for me”, Trump said, calling the African-American Christian community “one of God’s greatest gifts to America”. “And that there are many wrongs that must still be made right”. He said he wants a, quote, “new civil rights agenda”.
“I want to be me. We can do that, we can do that again”. “Factories everywhere, schools, especially schools, and new hope”.
“With each passing Trump attack, it becomes clearer that his strategy is just to say about Hillary Clinton what’s true of himself”, Clinton spokeswoman Jennifer Palmieri said.
“[Trump] didn’t come to hear us, he came to talk to one of us to tell us what he thinks we ought to do”, Pastor Lawrence Glass, one of the organisers of the protest, told Al Jazeera.
At the end of the speech, Trump was presented with an Israeli prayer shawl by the church’s Bishop Wayne Johnson.
Mr Trump has stepped up his attempts to appeal to minority voters in recent weeks as he tries to expand his appeal beyond his Republican base.
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The Republican nominee for president gave his first address before a predominantly black audience at Great Faith Ministries and avoided the bellicose language that marked his comments last month while speaking before a largely white audience in MI.
